Runeguard 039

Consciousness returned slowly.

“Dace, are you awake?” Beth asked, slapping me lightly on the face. “If you can hear me, you better bloody well open your eyes.” She paused, sounding anxious. “Your companion is growing agitated.” 

She slapped me again.

With ponderous effort, I forced my eyes open. Strands of orange and red covered my vision. Beth’s hair, I thought.

As the world swam into focus, I saw that she was staring upwards at something.

“I’m awake,” I wheezed.

Beth’s face spun around, her eyes wet with worry. “You’re alive!” she exclaimed.

“I think so,” I said, my lips twisting upwards into a smile of sorts. “What happened?”

Lauren knelt down next to her sister. “You fainted from the pain and blood loss, and exhaustion kept you under, but you’re fully healed now.”

A shadow fell across me. It was Gavin. “I swear man, you have more lives than a cat.”

I chuckled. “Thanks for that arrow by the way, it made all the difference.”

He nodded and moved off. Bayan took his place. “Dace, glad to see you’re still with us. Do you think you can communicate with your spirit guard? She won’t let us near the treasure chests.”

I lifted my head, and sure enough, saw a mass of black clouds hovering above the six chests that had appeared at the base of one of the chamber’s walls.

My brows drew down. The black dragon almost appeared to be guarding them. “Night, are you alright?”

A blurred draconic head took form in the clouds and peered down at me. “Dace, welcome back,” she said. “Are you feeling better?”

Even though my companion expressed no concern, I could sense the palpable relief underscoring her words. “I am, thank you,” I said. “What’s going on?”

The mists of Night’s being swirled into motion and floated towards me. “You were absent for so long, I wasn’t sure if the other humans had done you harm,” the black dragon spirit said. “I thought it best to keep them from the treasure until you awoke.”

I felt more than saw the Paragons shift back nervously as Night dove into my body, sheltering her spirit in me once more.

I rose to my feet. My legs still felt shaky, and my body was worn out, but otherwise I felt hale. I glanced at Bayan. “It’s alright now,” I said. “You can open the chests now; my companion won’t interfere.”

Bayan nodded and waved his team on, and as one, they rushed to the treasure chests.

I followed more slowly in their wake. “Adi, report.”

“As Lauren stated, your health is at maximum, but your stamina still needs to recover. The dungeon, as you have probably already guessed, is completed, and Night has gained another level. She is level eight now.”

“Good,” I thought, sensing the black dragon echo the sentiment. I fell silent for a moment, thinking about the battle as I limped slowly to the closest treasure chest.

The boss fight had lasted only a few frenetic minutes, and had been nothing like what I had expected. I had anticipated a drawn-out battle, one filled with the careful exchange of blows.

In hindsight, I was glad the battle went the way it did. If Night had not disrupted the minotaur’s opening charge… I was not certain any of us would have survived.

I turned my attention inwards. “Night, what happened between you and the boss early on in the fight?”

My companion responded with a question of her own. “What do you know of demons, Dace?”

“Nothing,” I said with a frown. “Why is that important?”

“You will understand in a minute,” Night assured me. “Dragons are not the only primal creatures to walk the Proving Grounds. Demons and angels are almost as primal in nature. One is born from divine Essence, the other from infernal Essence.”

My eyebrows shot up. “Infernal? As in: of being from hell?”

“Correct Dace,” the black dragon said. “The Creators were by all accounts a disparate group but were predominantly split into two warring camps: the divines on one side and the infernals on the other. The races of angels and demons were their primary servants.”

I shook my head in bemusement. It all sounded eerily familiar, but also strangely twisted from Earth’s own legends. Who or what are the Creators? I wondered. Gods? 

But as intriguing as I found the matter, now was not the time to ponder the mystery. “Go on,” I said.

“Infernal Essence is closely aligned with chaos,” Night said. “Many mistakenly consider them to be the same. They are not. Of the two, chaos is the more elemental… the more pure. In fact, many of the higher demon lords carry more than a touch of chaos themselves.”

I scratched at my chin, thinking about the look of fear I had seen on the minotaur’s face when Night first showed herself. “Are you saying the boss thought you were a demon lord?”

“Exactly,” said Night. “The minotaur was possessed by a demonic spirit. All demonic spirits are highly attuned to the presence of infernal and chaos Essences—or for that matter, divine and order Essences. The demon’s first instinct on seeing a being of pure chaos hurtling towards him would have been to flee.” She laughed. “Or cower in fear.”

“It seems there is still a lot I have to learn of the Proving Grounds,” I murmured as I stopped by the only still-sealed treasure chest. My anticipation built. What would I find inside? 

A second Class Stone hopefully.

I reached out to the chest, then hesitated, glancing to my right. 

The Paragons were there, clustered together and whispering furiously. They had already claimed their own rewards—and second dungeon run penalty or not—they looked immensely pleased with whatever they had gotten.

Beth caught my look. “Go on,” she said, urging me onwards. “Whatever is in there, I am sure, it will be great.”

I nodded and laid my hand on the closed chest.

A trio of System messages flickered across my vision.

Dungeon Notice 1050-C-08

Congratulations, your party has completed Dungeon 1050-C. For your reward, you have a choice between the following:

Option 1: A tier 3 vampirism Essence Gem, and a minor prey leash spellbook.

Option 2: A tier 3 lycanthropic Essence Gem, and a minor stunning blow ability tome.

Item: Vampirism Essence

Tier: 3. Description: grants a player the vampiric Essence. Human compatible: yes. 

Warning: this item cannot be sold or traded. If not used within ten hours of acquisition, this item will be recycled into the System for: 3 gold.

Weaknesses: the player incurs penalties when in direct sunlight, and must consume human blood to maintain their vampiric gifts.

Item: Lycanthropic Essence

Tier: 3. Description: grants a player the lycanthropy Essence. Human compatible: Yes. 

Warning: this item cannot be sold or traded. If not used within ten hours of acquisition, this item will be recycled into the System for: 3 gold.

Weaknesses: the player is periodically overcome by uncontrolled bouts of madness and is vulnerable to silver weapons.

My face split into a wide grin. 

Tier three Essences! Now this is more like it, I thought as I ran an avid gaze across the messages.

But before I could give my choice of reward any serious consideration, the notices disappeared and were replaced by another series of System messages.

Dace Tolman, due to your dogged pursuit of the Creators’ language and your near success at scribing one of its Runes, you have proven yourself a worthy candidate for one of the Creators’ greatest gifts. 

As a result, your potential rewards from the dungeon have been revised to include a third option.

For the reward of completing Dungeon 1050-C, you have a choice between the following:

Option 1: A tier 3 vampirism Essence Gem, and a minor prey leash spellbook.

Option 2: A tier 3 lycanthropic Essence Gem, and a minor stunning blow ability tome.

Option 3: A tier 4 Rune Essence Gem.

Item: Rune Essence

Tier: 4. Description: grants a player the Rune Essence. Human compatible: yes. 

Warning: this item cannot be sold or traded. If not used within ten hours of acquisition, this item will be recycled into the System for: 4 gold.

Weaknesses: the player cannot use scrolls to cast spells, nor can they learn spells from spellbooks.

My heart nearly stopped as I read the new System message—especially the last bit.

“Adi, is this right?” I breathed in breathless disbelief. “How can there be a tier four Essence?”

Adi was silent for an eternity before she answered. “There are only three tiers of Essences, Dace. A tier four Essence is an impossibility.”

“Then how do you explain the Rune Essence?”

“I cannot.”

My mind boggled at Adi’s answers. What did it mean that even my personal administrator did not know of the existence of a Rune Essence?

“Night, what about you, have you heard of a tier four Essence?”

“No, I have not,” she replied. The black dragon’s mental voice was unusually somber. “But I urge you to extreme caution. Such an Essence can only hold the secrets of the Creators’ language. It is priceless, and both boon and bane. If you take it on, you will be hunted to the ends of the Proving Grounds for the knowledge you hold.”

I swallowed, having come to much the same realization myself. I glanced at the Paragons. They were still gathered together. I desperately wanted to ask one of them if they had heard of such a thing as a tier four Essence. 

Yet I dared not.

Even more than the nature of my spirit companion, the existence of the Rune Essence had to be kept secret.

Dare I choose it?

But then again, how could I not?

My thoughts were awhirl at the choice before me. One of the rank three Essences was a safer choice, and from human myths—and my own run in with Marcos—I had a fair idea of what they had to offer.

The Rune Essence was a mystery. 

What could I do with it? I guessed that at the very least it would allow me to learn the language of the Runes, but what else? Would its use be purely scholarly? Would I be able to employ the Essence in combat at all?

“Adi,” I breathed, “what do you know of vampirism and lycanthropy?”

“I have never heard of them before, Dace.”

I stilled. “You haven’t?”

“Correct,” she replied. “But my ignorance of them is not unexpected.”

My brows crinkled. “It isn’t?”

“No,” Adi said. “Tier three Essences are not only exceedingly rare, they are also oftentimes locked to a particular species. With this being humans’ first appearance in the Proving Grounds, I suspect Sector 52 is the only region where they can currently be found.”

I nodded slowly, before turning my attention back to the System messages floating in front of me, and the choice awaiting me.

As much trepidation as I felt about choosing the mysterious Rune Essence, I knew it was undoubtedly the best choice. 

Closing my eyes, I made my decision.

You have acquired: a Rune Essence Gem.

Congratulations, Dace Tolman! You have discovered a tier 4 Essence.

I suppressed the gleeful chortle that threatened to escape as the Essence Gem dropped into my inventory and shot another furtive glance at the Paragons. None of them were paying any attention to me at the moment.

I didn’t want to wait to absorb my new Essence, yet I couldn’t afford for the others to observe any revealing aura that surrounded me. 

Inspiration struck. “Night, can you make your form dense enough to shroud me entirely from sight?”

“I can, Dace.”

“Do it.”

Night slipped out and coiled around me in streams of dense, black smoke. Soon she surrounded me completely, masking my own sight and hiding me from the Paragons’ eyes too.

Not delaying further, I willed the Gem out of my inventory and received the expected System message.

Rune Essence Gem activated. 

Do you wish to recycle this Gem back into the System or absorb its Essence into your available Nodes?

Nodes required: 4. Essence Nodes available: 6 / 17.

I willed my response, then waited with bated breath.

A heartbeat after I made my decision, another System message appeared.

Warning: Breach of administrative order 52-24 detected. Prohibited Essence Gem absorbed. Scrubbing unauthorized nodes.